Julia, Josh, And Kevin Make Me A Birthday Video

While I was away in California, Julia passed a video camera around to my friends and had them give testimonials about me for my birthday, and edited it all together.

Josh and Kevin worked on their own separate section and uploaded it to youtube. It is laced with inside Jokes, so if you don’t get it, you probably don’t really know us very well, or about the videos we made together when I was 15, one of them using a My Buddy doll as the main character.

Moving To My New Pad

Julia helped me move into my new one-bedroom studio pad today. We borrowed Tommy’s van to load all my stuff into the trailer.

Now I will be walking distance to the University (R.I.P. UNM, 2004) and good places to eat, other than Dominos and Blake’s lotaburger.

I will miss Jake and Monty, and easy access to rocking a DW drum kit and bass cab in the garage, but at least this way I can be a straight shot away from my band’s practice space anyway.

Also, Kyle and Casey from Flood The Sun just moved into the practice space next to Coma’s.

Jack Frick & Synchronicity

Last night we got stuck in the Phoenix Airport because our airplane to take us home had a mechanical. It was about 11 pm when we checked into our hotel, and a little less than 100 degrees outside, and inside our room.

This morning we made our way back to the airport, and my tiredness led me to the Starbucks that was installed next to our gate. My mom followed, wearing her brand new “Frick” shirt from the Frick winery in California. While waiting in line, the Frick shirt caught the eye of the man standing in front of me and told my mom that he had the same last name.

I couldn’t believe it, because what-are-the-chances, you say… Well we talked briefly on Frick-based history such as the possibility of our roots tying back to the same locations, aka, being related somehow. Then the barista placed my drink and his on the counter simultaneously and he asked, “Is this the hot chocolate?” She said yes, slid the drink towards him, and on the cup was written in marker:

JACK

I didn’t say much else because I didn’t really register it in a way that I could immediately jump into explaining the background of my Grandpa Jack and what the whole trip was about.

I told my dad about it, and as it seemed more and more unbelievable, we hunted him down at his departure gate. He and his wife were there and introduced themselves to my dad.

Sure enough, name was Jack Frick, named after his father, Jack Frick.

The conversation and connection was pretty amazing to me, so I asked them if I could take their photo for my blog.

Like Fricks, they kindly agreed.

The Frick Winery

Early this morning my dad came to the hotel room I’m sharing with Erin, Josh, and Natalie and said, “C’mon guys, we’re going to be late. We’re all meeting for breakfast.”

“Where are we meeting?” I ask.

“At…

…The Pantry.”

Today we had to drive 6 hours south to Oakland because all of the flights in town were too full. Before cramming in the van with 6 adults and a baby, what did I eat? A huge omlette with hashbrowns and beef from…

The Pantry.

About 4 hours later we stopped in a little town called Willits and I ate a salad like it was medication.

There were vineyards all along the freeway during the drive, and my Dad knew of one where they make “Frick” branded wine.

We stopped in, met Bill Frick, the man who started Frick winery. While the place seemed to be in the middle of nowhere, it was set up like an enchanted secret place that is wedged somwhere in a timeless reality as if the wise-being holding guard is also serving you, and fully understanding that souls only come about to visit once every few creations.

I knocked back a few wine samples until I found out you can’t actually get just a single glass of wine like a bar, you have to buy a bottle. I let mum and dad keep the peace with Bill Frick, and keep-the-peace they did by buying $75 worth in Frick winery merchadise and a bottle of Cinsaut (Sin-SO) Rose.

I still get nervous about wine tasting for fear that I’m not spitting, sniffing, or reacting enough.

Jack Frick’s Funeral

Today we had the funeral. The family got together and talked about the life of Grandpa Jack in the form of an open mic testimonial of the amazing life experiences each of his 7 children shared with him.

Obituary:

John R. “Jack” Frick of McKinleyville, CA, died at home surrounded by family, on July 26, 2011 after a brief illness.

Born in Kansas City, MO to Charles and Margaret Frick, Jack was the youngest of six children. During WWII, he proudly helped build the B-25 bomber and later served as Radioman in the United States Coast Guard.

Meeting his true love and Irish lass at a church picnic, Jack married in 1951, thus beginning his legacy as a loving husband and devoted father. Concurrently, he established a near 30-year-career in Wage Administration for North American Aviation and later, at the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory.

His heart and soul will forever live on with his surviving spouse of 60 years, Catherine, sons and daughters, Ellen, Kevin, Tim, Brian, Teresa, Patty, and Charles, their spouses, sixteen grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren.

Jack was a life-long and devout Catholic. The Rosary will be recited at Christ the King Catholic Church, 1951 Mckinleyville Ave., Mckinleyville, Ca. at 7:00 PM Thursday, July 28, 2011 with a Funeral mass at 11:00 AM Friday, July 29, 2011. Arrangements are under the care of Goble’s Fortuna Mortuary, Fortuna, Ca.

The Pantry

We’re staying at the Comfort Inn in Arcata, CA. It was the best deal we could find for the lowest price that 5-stains-or-less could offer.

Across the street there is an eggs-ketchup-&-burgers restaurant called The Pantry. I already had eaten the continental breakfast at the hotel across from ours, but I decided to eat again. My mom got a “side” of fries. They’re so generous at family restaurants.

An hour later, my sister and Tim had just flown in and were hungry, so we headed over to the Greek restaurant across from The Pantry and I ate again. By this point I was getting pretty full.

After eating at the Greek place, we went to my Grandpa’s Rosary ceremony. When it was over, people started talking about maybe getting some food somewhere, we all looked at eachother and somebody said, “I know! let’s go to this place called The Pantry.”

I ate a hot fudge sundae for dinner because I was kind of getting tired of eating the actual meals at The Pantry. After that, everybody sang happy birthday to my cousin Vanessa. Then everybody sang happy birthday to yours truly, because mine was yesterday.

Nobody really wanted to leave The Pantry, so I left early to sip some Jameson with Josh in 106, and cousins caught wind of the party and joined us and we all gave a toast to Jack Frick.

29

Today is my birthday. My original goal was to ride Josh and Kevin’s epic 1200 foot zip line, but plans changed.

I went out with my parents to walk my grandpa’s dog, Daisy Mae. She’s a one-eyed rescued chihuahua/pug mix.

I wanted to mark the day with something, because I like to remember previous birthdays.  During the walk I found this spot:

It was impossible for me to look at the beach and turn around and leave, so my parents left me at the beach while they drove around town to do other things.

The shoreline was further than I thought, so I ran as fast as I could to spend as much time close to the water as possible. At one moment a did an epic, hyper hip-kid leap over a log and kept running. Maybe I was influenced by this song and video that I’ve been obsessively watching/listening to on repeat since I’ve been out here.

It’s been a week since I arrived in Cali. Ceremony for Grandpa Jack is Friday.

Jack.

I’ve been in California the last week. My grandpa (Dad’s dad) started slowing down over the last few months, initially diagnosed as having Dementia. He digressed from walking daily with his dog to having his drivers license taken away to him to sleeping 16 hours a day or more within one month. Eventually he ended up in the hospital after taking a couple of falls, and they discovered a tumor on his brain.

With that diagnosis and declared “days to weeks to live”, I flew out to northern California to see him for the last time. He died today at 11:20 a.m. in his house.

I had the privilege of making some of the most significant memories of my childhood with spending entire summers at his house, wreaking havoc with cousins in and around the surrounding space filled with trees no shorter than 100 feet and the sweet smell of rain and pine.

If there was one thing I can take with me now is his example of developing an enormous appreciation of the simple things, and to be drawn towards those who never have an ill word to say about anybody.

The Coma Recovery – Goddverb – Released On Deep Elm Records

Coma Recovery Just Released Goddverb on Deep Elm Records.

“This is what the future sounds like…yeah, it’s heavy like that. Like if the giant mechanized robots fromTransformers had a band…they would sound like this. Seeping with texture, tenacity and technical prowess that unveils layers most bands can’t imagine reaching, Coma Recovery‘s headphone-begging collection of progressive post-rock ventures to dark places, nearly drowning you in the expansive nature of the sound. Goddverb is their testament to what it feels like to be human…as seen through they eyes of a band that has always put art form and expression above all else. In a world saturated by the fast buck, the ringtone and the remix, Goddverb reminds us that in the midst an industry collapsing from it’s failure to bring us simple substance, music can still be bold and outspoken, still invoke power and passion, still inspire and confound in the same breath, still hold onto 100% of its integrity. In the end, it doesn’t feel like an album so much as an unrequited love affair with life…branded deep in every song. This is one of the most stunning records to be released this year. Believe it.”

Go here to listen!

Resolutions to be made

My niece gave me some advice today.

“You’re almost 29. Get yourself together, Uncle dumdum.”

Natalie couldn’t be more right.

In 2 weeks I only have one year left of my twenties. I’m turning 29.

For fun I started to google “things to do before you die” and “things to do before 30″.

Lots of ideas came up that were pretty cool, but none of them said, “get back on your blog, stoopid.”

Although, there was one that said “journal everyday for one year.”

I drove Peter MacNichol to the ABQ airport from Santa Fe, (ignore the name-drop) and told me that his advice to all young people was to do 3 things before you die:

• Learn to play an instrument.
• Keep a journal everyday.
• Learn a foreign language.

I polished my nails on my shirt and said,

“Check, check, and check. Any more brain busters, Peter MacNichol?”

(Minus the foreign language thing)

For my 29th birthday, I want to kick it off by riding on Josh and Kevin’s 1200 ft zipline. It goes 49 mph. It’s 4 futbol fields (the foreign language thing) long. It’s beyond insane.

The Zipline took them 3 months of intense work to construct. I was with them when they were first brain storming the idea, initially much smaller in scale than what developed.

That’s the platform. They obsessively updated their plans while building it, drove all the way to oklahoma to truck 9 telephone poles back to New Mexico, and finally they’re leaping superman style, head-first into the San Juan canyon over and over again.

I feel brave now. I feel brave. I feel brave. I feel bave. I mean, brave. Brave. Brave. Yeah…